140. Wimpy Wimpy Petter

  Serac clambered over the wall, then immediately shut off [Metabolic Shift]. Fending off Rodrin had eaten into her [Satiety], now leaving just a quarter of the creamy-orange bar. But there was another matter requiring more urgent attention.

  “Chef?”

  Right on cue, a pale-faced mackerel man rushed over to Serac’s side, [Ulvknall Liver] already in hand. It was her very last slice; she took it gratefully and chewed at record speed. The benefits were three-fold: stanch the [Bleeding], grant 20 seconds of [Regen], and ‘heal’ about a quarter of the [Satiety] gauge, bringing her back to half-full.

  With that, it was really time to pick up the pace. For fending off Rodrin had been as loud as costly, and Serac had no way to guess how long she could remain undetected. So far so lucky; at least the entry point remained deserted.

  Somewhat surprisingly, the Queen’s private room was similar in shape and size to the one Serac herself had been assigned. If anything, it looked a good deal more spartan, with only a simple desk and a rolled-up Nether-kelp bed in the way of furniture. It was fair to say the balcony was the room’s only real distinguishing feature.

  Serac didn’t know what she’d expected, but it hadn’t been this. She was overcome by a powerful sense of déjà vu. Much of her own life had been spent inside a room like this. Stripped of all creature comforts, granted the bare minimum required to while away the hours between one torment and another. To her—and perhaps to Loha as well—this was ‘home’.

  Not for the first time, Serac was struck by what she and the Rakshasa queen had in common. She did her best to dispel the notion. For it was their differences that had sent them on a collision course. Onward then with the mission.

  Here again, division of labor proved sensible. Serac went straight for the desk while Petter roamed and scoured every inch of the room. It only made sense for the Rakshasa to use her eyes, while the Yaksha read for clues potentially hidden in the ripples.

  Clearly, Loha never expected anyone to dare raid the Queen’s chamber. She’d made no effort to hide the documents that had passed between her and her co-conspirators. It almost feels too easy? The thought did cross Serac’s mind, but she pushed it aside in the interest of urgency. Even if the sneaky approach turned out to be a dud, she and Zacko could still pivot to what they usually did best. Strictly speaking, given the obstacles they’d overcome thus far, they were already halfway there.

  “Lots of letters from Palmr Jorgensen, like we expected,” she muttered now for her own benefit as much as Petter’s. “Much of it innocuous; stuff about restocking the kitchen and whatnot. But there are several mentions of something called ‘emerald syrup’, which I assume is code for the Realmtree Dew. Eh, Petey? What do you reckon?”

  “H—huh? Y—yes, Miss, that sounds about right.”

  “Hmm, then there are these other notes she seemed to have kept for herself. A few words I can make out here and there, like ‘bellows’, ‘temperature’, ‘pump’, and ‘siphon’, but the rest of it is written in these strange symbols. I guess Loha did take some precautions in case someone might read these, hey?”

  “… Y—yes. W—whatever you say, Miss.”

  Despite the urgency of her task, Serac couldn’t help but glance up at Petter. His stutter was back, which meant he was either nervous or distracted. Judging by his pale face and fidgety feet, he was both.

  “Petey? Is everything alright? What’s on your mind?”

  Petter stopped his fidgeting, then looked to Serac with forlorn misery. The latter’s concern turned to alarm, as she was reminded of a deeply unpleasant memory. Petter had worn the same expression once before, when he was callously and brutally mocked by a catfish businessman.

  “I don’t know what I’d expected,” the mackerel exclaimed, visibly distraught. “That I’d made something of myself just by becoming a Wayfarer? Like I’d flick on a match and instantly become a different person? I’m still the same old Petter Svensen. A good-for-nothing coward. A freeloader, as Mister Palmr once—”

  “But you’re not—”

  “I am, Miss! I know you mean well, but a lie is still a lie. Just now, I watched you and Miss Rodrin from the safety of the balcony and did nothing. I knew I ought to help, but when it got down to it, I just… lost my nerve. You should just go on without me, Miss. I’ll only hold you back. After all, I can’t do anything without relying on—”

  That was when Serac slapped Petter, open-handed and right across his face.

  [43!]

  Serac inwardly winced. Her improved [Substance], together with Petter’s inferior Physical Mitigation, resulted in noticeably bigger damage than what Zacko had sustained some two months ago. She couldn’t lose her nerve, however. Not with the mission hanging in the balance.

  “Well, I’m relying on you now!” she yelled in Petter’s face. “So snap out of whatever this is and focus! Oh, and one more thing: don’t you ever call me a liar again!”

  Had she overcooked it? It certainly appeared that way for the first Ksana or two following her outburst, as Petter’s lips quivered and his round, stricken eyes brimmed with tears.

  But then the mackerel chef gave his own face a rough rubdown, and his tears went the way of his miserable expression. The Yaksha looked up at Serac again with clear eyes and tightly drawn lips. Maybe not quite a fledgling just yet, but the hatchling was nevertheless growing before Serac’s eyes.

  “Good,” she said, much gentler in tone. “Now, if you’ve got a second, help me make sense of these, er, drawings.”

  Among Loha’s personal notes—those filled with indecipherable hieroglyphics rather than the Common Meruvian Vernacular—were several pages that contained no words at all. The first such illustration was instantly recognizable: a vertical rectangle, ‘crowned’ by a mushroom cloud and ‘rooted’ with multiple, slender extensions.

  “That’s gotta be the Realmtree, right?” Serac resumed her muttered commentary. “And look at these arrows drawn on the Trunk. Or inside the Trunk? Whatever they are, they all seem to be pointing up.”

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  “Is that what’s meant by ‘pump’?” Petter took a stab. “A mechanism to pump the Realmtree’s internal reservoir up toward the Crown?”

  Serac’s attention fell upon one of the ‘roots’ in particular. It was in the very center, noticeably broader and longer than the others, notable also for being filled in with black ink. The taproot.

  “I’ll bet you anything this filled-in portion represents—er, represented—Mulaharta. And the fact Mully’s in this picture at all must mean it served an important function in this here ‘mechanism’. We all assumed it was just a worm that ate the Realmtree hollow, but could it have also been spitting stuff back out?”

  “Spitting what out? And why?”

  “Look at this.”

  A second page featured an array of smaller diagrams. Most of the diagrams made no sense to a pair of laysouls… except for one. A single leaf, one end dripping with a teardrop figure, obviously meant to be a liquid of some description. And the kicker: a bucket-like receptacle to catch this teardrop for ‘harvest’…

  “The Realmtree Dew,” Petter murmured.

  “I think so,” Serac agreed. “I’ll bet you the purpose of this ‘pump’ is to extract—no, ‘siphon’—as much of the Realmtree Dew as possible. In greater amounts and a lot faster than what’s naturally feasible.”

  “Is that what really caused the withering? But… by that logic, the whole Tree would wither, not just the Roots.”

  “And maybe it would have. Maybe it was only a matter of time before the withering reached the Trunk. Then the Stammers would’ve really had something to worry about.”

  “But… why?” Petter asked again, frowning in consternation. “All for some petty vendetta against her husband’s bastard child? For that, the Queen would hollow out the entire Realmtree—put all of Pretjord at risk of starvation?”

  As Serac pondered the differences between herself and the Rakshasa queen, a familiar answer floated to the top of her mind. Because she could. She sensed it wasn’t the whole answer, but at the same time, she realized it wasn’t far off.

  Because she’d remembered something else as she examined the Queen’s drawings. Because the diagrams were parts of a larger, cohesive whole. A blueprint. Much like what an architect might draw…

  Along with the recollection, Trippy Version One’s contemplative words rang anew: I’m in awe of the intricate craftsmanship that went into constructing this prison. It’s artful is what it is. Whoever was the original architect of the Damnatorium clearly had a bold vision and the means to follow through in spectacular fashion.

  A chill ran down Serac’s spine, simultaneously as her right temple pricked with warning. The puzzle she’d been working on ever since her first meeting with the royal couple—nay, ever since she first heeded the ripple-borne call of an ascended Hellspawn—was finally coming together.

  Bellows. Temperature. Pump. Siphon. DIAPHRAGM. FURNACE. Vision and follow-through.

  A Dew-harvesting mechanism inside the Realmtree, which threatened to turn an entire population of Yakshas into Starvelings. An intricate shrine to torture called the Damnatorium, which had, over centuries, turned an untold number of Rakshasas into Frenzied Penitents. Could it be that the two abominations shared the same architect?

  But the question remained. If anything, it loomed ever lager. Why? Why? Why? Because she could? No, that wouldn’t cut it. Not when there were literal centuries of kinship, fellowship, and love at stake. Then why?

  Because this is her Path. Serac mused again, but kept it to herself. And this is the only way Loha knows to keep going.

  Despite the urgency of her task, it felt to Serac as though time had stopped. She lifted the page with the leaf drawing, turning it over just to remove it from her sight.

  That was how she and Petter came upon the third page. A single illustration, and familiar, thanks not to a life-sized reference but to the simple fact Serac had seen a drawing almost exactly like it. Just earlier this morning, in fact, drawn into the dirt by her accomplice.

  “It’s the Apical Bough, Petey. Looks just like the one you drew. Guess you did a pretty thorough job with your ‘recon’, huh?”

  Petter ignored Serac’s quip, to instead stare closely at the schematic, one scaled finger tracing the lines and circles. It occurred to Serac that he too was taking stock of similarities and differences—between Loha’s drawing and his.

  Then, without a word, Petter jumped away from the desk and ran, back toward the balcony. After a brief hesitation, Serac followed Petter onto the balcony. The mackerel now knelt over the amber floor, his brow furrowed in concentration.

  “What is it? What did you find?”

  “Shh!”

  Serac took a step back, startled by Petter’s welcome but sudden assertiveness. She realized her friend was in the midst of a finely tuned ripple-read, so she gave him a wide berth and let him work.

  As she waited, she pondered what might lie beneath this balcony of petrified sap—King Tyr’s wedding gift to his Rakshasa queen and the only discernible luxury in her room. It was, as Serac had experienced first-hand, held up by about a hundred feet of support, built from the nearest branch below. Could it be that this branch too had been excavated, thereby offering passage into the Realmtree’s hollow center?

  Not long into his read, Petter moved again. Using SHAKER, he poured a layer of fine crystals onto the amber floor. He must’ve found what he was looking for, and Serac was deathly curious what it might be, but then—

  “Your Majesty?”

  A muffled voice from the other side of the room! A servant? A soldier?

  “Pardon my intrusion, but I must ask. Are you well? It’s just that we’ve been investigating the source of a commotion, and it seems to have come from this room. Do—do you require any aid?”

  Serac hesitated again, caught between waiting on Petter or dealing with the new ‘threat’. She ended up taking the middle road, unholstering REVOLVER where she stood and aiming it at the door.

  “Queen Loha? Is—is that a no? Or… are you unable to speak? If—if it’s the latter, then I…”

  The soldier too was hesitant, but he must know that someone roughly Rakshasa-shaped was inside the room. Damn these Yakshas and their ripple-reading; no privacy at all! Serac would have to act sooner rather than later, but she really hated the idea of confronting an Anchored soul. Petey, please… whatever you’re doing, hurry it up!

  [MATCHSTICK Spell: HEAT SOURCE]

  Just in time! Serac heard a soft ‘crack’ and a faint ‘pop’ at her feet. Looking down, she saw the balcony floor was now in need of repairs, namely due to a hole large enough to comfortably fit a slender Rakshasa woman.

  This in itself wasn’t surprising, given what Serac had already theorized. What did surprise her was that the hole kept going. Deep ‘underground’ and perhaps even the length of the whole wall. That wasn’t the only sign the hole was ‘Yaksha-made’—that it’d already existed long before a MATCHSTICK-wielding chef had cracked it open. For its walls had been smoothed down, one side lined by wooden planks that could easily serve as footholds or handholds. A ladder.

  Serac gulped in anticipation. Had it all gone a little too smoothly? Should her proverbial hackles be up for the possibility of a trap? An ambush? But it was a moot point, when a clear and pressing danger already knocked on the door.

  “P—pardon my impudence, Your Majesty, but I’m left with no choice. I’m coming in!”

  Serac didn’t need any more encouragement. She stepped onto the secret ladder, with Petter following close behind.

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